Theresa May left the EU leaders’ summit with Brexit talks still deadlocked over the question of the so-called Brexit bill. As a consolation prize, EU leaders have agreed that they would open “internal preparatory discussions” on the future UK-EU relationship.

This would be a strictly intra-EU discussion, though. The Brits will not be invited to take part. For her part, Mrs May continued to refuse to spell out what “commitments” the UK will honour in any Brexit financial settlement, insisting that the €20bn she offered in her speech Florence ought to be enough to move talks forward.

So what happens next? Here we look at Mrs May’s options ahead of the next EU leaders summit on December 12:

Stick - Mrs May continues to stand her ground

How will the European Union react?

The EU remains wedded to its hardline position that there will be no trade or transition talks until it judges that “sufficient...